Sunrise: Sebastian and Emma's Story
by Our Name Is Sam
Summary: The story of the only group of witnesses not to make it to help the Cullens. The only coven/pack to exist. These characters are NOT in Meyer's books, I made them up, so...
1. Preface: The Beginning

_"Dum inter homines sumus, colamus humanitatem. As long as we are among humans, let us be humane."  
_

_Seneca_

Book I

Emma

The Beginning

1:53 PM, Wednesday, October the fifth.

Seven minutes 'til the animals were let out.

Donald Hanson sat in his expensive high-backed leather chair. He swiveled around a few times, then sharpened his pencils, and did other things that were all signs of restlessness.

He knew he had needed a break; too much work was coloring his hair gray more than he would like. But this, sitting idle for six hours was painful.

Hanson-Lane High School had been in his family for generations. His father had been the principal, his father's father had been principal, and so on. His great great grandfather, Daniel Hanson had started the school with a colleague, straight out of college. Rebecca Lane had died of cholera the morning of the opening. He thought that the name should be changed, but it was tradition to honor the co-founder. Each principal had the opportunity to change the name, but never did, because every principal since had been a Hanson.

Principal Hanson looked down at his lunch. A tofu burger, plain yogurt, and that horrible tasting juice that they tried to pass off as apple…

"Diet" was the one word he had dreaded ever since marrying his wife. He knew the day would come. He huffed.

_I hate my life..., h_e thought.

He was sitting there thinking about ways to make his feisty wife see the light (of fast food goodness) when, the intercom came to life.

"Sir?" The usual fireworks in her young voice weren't there

He depressed the button. "Yes Jennifer?" Because of her unusual depressed voice, he took on his unusual eager voice.

"You have visitors."

He sighed and leaned back. "Jennifer, I thought I told you that I wasn't receiving visitors at all today."

"Yes sir, but they keep insisting that it's urgent. They said you'd understand…"

"I never set up any meetings for today," he checked his schedule, "send them away."

"Y-yes sir…"

He sighed again, rubbing his face. He couldn't honestly say that he was displeased of the interruption to his perfect day.

He sighed and put his arm over his face. It was o--

"One of those days?" The voice that finished his thought had an extreme sense of calm that he didn't think anyone could achieve. It made him think of a loving mother hen.

Startled, he looked up. When did they come in?

Definitely not a mother hen.

Six people stood in the room. The one who had spoken was closest to him. Her blonde hair was more golden, like maidens in the old stories, than true blonde. Her pale skin almost shined, and her brown eyes stared back at him. His mouth was hanging open, to say she was exquisitely beautiful would be an understatement. In fact all the people in the room, excluding himself, were beautiful, and not to mention weird.

They stood in couples. To his right was a tall man, with short light brown hair, and vivid green eyes. His skin was just a bit darker than the others, like a tan. His companion's hair was, however, black but it was long and wavy. She, on the other hand, had vivid blue eyes.

The pair to his left was comprised of a man with medium length blonde hair, that hung past his ears. He had normal blue eyes. He was shorter than the other two men, but tall nonetheless. The woman or rather young adult, she looked very young, had curly dark brown hair. Herr eyes were hidden behind dark glasses. She also had papery pale skin, but there was a distinct olive color to it. Perhaps she was Italian.

The most startling person in the room, stood just beside the woman who had spoken, who was standing right in front of the principal's desk. The man was the tallest of the three, easily 6'3". His long, thin, silvery, pure white hair hung loose, it came almost to his elbows. His skin was pale and ashy. He had brown eyes as well.

He stared straight at the principal, who realized just how big the world really was by that gaze.

Principal Hanson, not one to be scared easily, wiped the sweat from his forehead, gulped, and sat up. He folded his clammy hands on his desk. The corners of the blonde haired man's mouth turned up in a slight smile.

The middle aged principal looked at them all.

"…Oh for god's sake, get it over with."

They did.

The blonde man's companion removed her glasses, revealing gleaming red eyes. The two in front of his desk blinked. He thought they were crying, but it was actually their contacts dissolving. Slowly he could see their true eye color. The woman also had red eyes. But the man, his eyes were the most extraordinary things the principal had ever seen. At first glance, they might look violet, or red, but really they were magenta. A vivid electric magenta, mixed with a hint of red.

"Dr. Hanson." The white haired man's voice surprised him, in being quieter, even than the woman's. "I believe you called."

Dr. Hanson had believed many things.

He thought back to that night. It was dark, an empty street, a payphone, and him. He had believed the voice on the other side was a light hearted war veteran who was serious about his work. He had believed that they wouldn't be prompt. He had believed that they would be late, as all his other appointments were. He had believed that they would be normal, like Home Land Security, the Marines, or the freaking Men in Black. But not this.

"You said 1:54," the man said. Dr. Hanson looked at the digital clock sitting on the corner of his desk. 1:54.

Aunt Helen had said that she could get him help. He had told her his problem at school. She said she could get him help. He should have known…

"Ah. Yes." He got up and went to shake the man's hand. He wasn't going to look like a sissy. He offered his hand.

The white haired man hesitated. Dr. Hanson raised an eyebrow, secretly triumphant at winning this test of manhood. The man sighed, and took his hand. Dr. Hanson flinched. Ice cold. Even as he looked, Dr. Hanson's hand started to lose color, and turn blue with numbness. Shivering, he withdrew.

"I am Don Han—oh, but you already knew that."

"Yes we did." the blonde man said, with a smirk.

His companion slapped him on the chest and he faked a look of pain. Then she turned to the principal, and smiled. She looked the most normal of the lot. Not just physical features, just the subconscious feel you got when you saw her made you think that she was okay. "Don't mind Leander, he's just cranky. He had to eat a poor copy off of Cap'n Crunch this morning." She laughed.

Leander rolled his eyes, but Dr. Hanson welcomed this new sense of friendliness. He smiled back.

The white haired one spoke up, he gestured to the brown haired man and the woman beside him. "That is Sebastian and Emily." Sebastian shook his hand, and gave a small smile, but Emily couldn't even make that much. She just nodded.

Then the white haired man, obviously the leader--Dr. Hanson had gathered _that _much at least—turned in Leander's direction. "You've already been introduced to Leander," who just looked at the principal evenly, "and that is Samantha." She smiled and took the hand. She squeezed before she let go, telling him everything was okay.

Then the leader gestured to the angelic woman beside him. "This is my wife Shiloh." She shook his hand and smiled as well. "And I am Hadrian." He started to smile, but spotted the look of growing fear on the principal's face and stopped.

Dr. Hanson reseated himself, and gestured to the chairs in front of his desk. "Please."

Sebastian stayed by Emily's side, and held her hand; she still wore that pained look. Shiloh wrapped an arm around Hadrian's waist, and remained standing. Only Leander came up, to Dr. Hanson's loathing, sat down, and propped his feet up on the desk. The principal decided to see if some of his authority would work.

"Kindly remove your feet from my face."

"Oopsies, sorry pops." He removed them. Samantha wore an annoyed look. She yanked Leander up from the chair and led him outside.

There were a few awkward moments of silence between the remaining five people in the room, until the argument outside ended.

The door opened and Samantha came back in, leading a depressed Leander. He put his hands in his pockets and mumbled. "Sorry."

Dr. Hanson resisted the urge to rub it in, "Thank you." He leaned forward, and turned to address everyone. "Now, there have been some disappearances around my school. And by some, I mean one. When something goes missing twice may be forgivable, but not when it's some_one_. One of my freshman disappeared of the grounds a month ago. Now, I have done all I can to keep the parents, their lawyers, and the faculty at bay. I've assured them that there won't be any more disappearances. Despite that, attendance is low anyway. It seems that parents aren't taking chances, and are pulling their kids anyway. I can't have that. If one more goes missing, I'm finished."

Sebastian spoke for the first time. "What do you want us to do?"

"I want you to guard the campus on school hours. The woods around the campus are thick and dense enough for you to stand there without scaring any of the students. I don't want them to know I've employed vampires to secure the school. If any of them told parents, well I could kiss retirement goodbye. Not because they would be afraid of their kids coming home with bite marks, and looking a little pale, of course. But, you can imagine…I'd be shipped off to the farm.

"What makes you think we can do anything about disappearing kiddies?" Leander said, inspecting his nails.

"When the first kid was abducted, there were…strange circumstances."

"Oh goodie, I love clues." Leander mocked.

"Hush!" Hadrian said, raising his voice. Needless to say he hushed.

"No clues, try blood, a trail of blood leading out of the campus, and through the trees."

"That doesn't seem unusual in abductions, albeit violent ones, but still. A trail of blood doesn't really say much." Samantha finished, and began to twirl a loose strand of hair.

"So the fact that there were at least 10 liters of the stuff mucking up the grass doesn't," he made air quotes, "'say much?'" A smug grin slipped onto his face.

Samantha's jaw dropped and even Leander looked surprised.

Sebastian looked thoughtful. "The human body only contains about 5.6 liters of blood. And that's a fully grown adult; a freshman would have probably at least 5 liters."

"Yes," Dr. Hanson said, "At first Crime Scene thought it was from two victims. But the blood trail could only have been made by one person bleeding, besides the fact that the same exact DNA was found in all the blood. Which means…" he trailed off, expecting someone to finish.

Hadrian did. "It wasn't from the child."

"Exactly my point, so, okay, maybe if there was less blood it might have been a human. But from that amount…there's just no way. No human has that much blood."

"We will investigate," Hadrian said.

"Good." Dr. Hanson sat back and crossed his arms.

"We'll be here tomorrow. 8 AM."

He nodded.

They filed out. But Hadrian stopped.

"Oh and Dr. Hanson…" The tall vampire turned to stare at him.

"Perhaps it's best you don't venture out into the woods. Nature walks wouldn't be healthy under these circumstances."

Dr. Hanson's eyes widened. "You've been watching me?!"

"Pleasant evening," he chided, then closed the door behind him.

Doctor Donald Hanson stared at the exact place the door for the remainder for the last three minutes of the day.

When this was over, he was definitely going send in his resignation--he looked at his cold lunch as the bell rang, and sounds of havoc outside floated in--and have him a nice hot cheeseburger on the way home.


	2. A Job

A Job

I woke up. I jumped when I saw his face, the combination of black hair and pale green eyes always scared, or at least intimidated everyone. Then I realized that I got the same reaction all the time. He shook me gently.

"Em. Wake up. We gotta go in an hour."

I rubbed my eyes. Slowly I got up, fully dressed, as we were every time we went to sleep. What was the point of fancy silk pj's if they just get shredded every time we phased.

He helped me up by the arm. Sebastian's face was full of concern.

"Emma. You should hunt soon."

He was right. Of course he was right.

"I'll do it tonight, after we finish at the school."

I looked over to his bed, it was wrecked. Pieces of it lying everywhere, the sheets in ribbons, the tattered mattress bleeding foam, and the dry wall behind it was riddled with claw marks.

I put my hand on his cheek. "Did you have another dream?"

He looked away. "It's nothing."

We walked, arm in arm, to the door. I looked back at the room. It was huge; a floor to ceiling window took up the entirety of one wall. The early sunlight flooded in, and painted the room a light orange. The doors to the walk in closet were open, revealing what must have been thousands of sweatshirts, t-shirts, jeans, and so on. It wasn't nearly as big as Sam's; she didn't even need the stuff. Just a normal closet would do.

Us on the other hand…yeah, we needed at least four changes a day, and on bad days....well, you can imagine. There were two beds six feet away from each other. Well, one bed. I glanced at his bed again.

We walked down the hall, and into the living room/kitchen/dining room.

Sam was fluttering about, cooking all sorts of stuff. It was hard feeding a monster like Leander. He was sitting, with his feet propped up on another chair. As usual he was bare-chested; he didn't bother much with clothes, or at least not more than a pair of shorts.

He was reading Sports Illustrated, while wolfing (the irony is sickening) down a grilled cheese sandwich. From the crusts on his plate, and the crumbs covering the table, I could tell it was his fifth.

All ten of the burners were being used. Each one had some sort of a frying pan, frying something ridiculously bad for you, but oh so good. One of the plusses of being a werewolf was that it was impossible to get fat. Sam had no trouble balancing all of them. She was a blur around the kitchen. She had parsley, carrots, tomatoes chopped, and a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch shoved in front of Leander, before you could say "Buffy".

She turned around. "Hey guys!" She beamed.

"Hey!" We hugged.

Being in love with Leander, made it easier for her to be around us, she didn't mind. Even from the start, when she first joined the coven/pack, she harbored us no ill will. Then, the spark flared between the two, and whaddayaknow, we've got a vamp den mother.

She pulled away and continued cooking, humming to herself.

Sebastian yawned, "Where's Hadrian and Shiloh?"

"Out," Leander said between mouthfuls.

We all knew what that meant.

Hunting.

"Sam, isn't time for you yet?" I realized that she hadn't been hunting in a while.

"Yeah, it's getting there. I'll go tonight."

"We're going tonight."

"Oh, great! We can race."

Leander looked up. "I'm coming then."

Sebastian rolled his eyes. Leander won, he always won. Even when he lost, he won…, according to Leander.

He finished his cereal and sat back rubbing his stomach. "Babe, I think you should hunt with your own kind, once in a while."

"I do. Shiloh's great. She taught me a lot."

"Hadrian too scary?"

She flinched.

No one wanted to be there when Hadrian hunted. Leander went once, only because Sam challenged him to it. He came back claiming he was fine, but it was obvious he was traumatized. Hadrian was old, very old. He wasn't like the rest of their kind. His eyes made that obvious. He said that it was like a vampiric age marker system. You could tell which tri-century a vampire was from by their eyes. No one had ever asked how old he really was, like _exactly_ how old. He was kind, kinder than people or even vampires would suppose. Hadrian truly was a good person, but there was no denying his nature. He was terrifying when he let his instincts take over.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that."

She turned again, slowly this time, and forced a smile. "It's okay. I know you didn't." She kissed him on the forehead.

Sam resumed her cooking, but was silent the rest of the morning.

I remembered the day she had come back from that hunting trip. She had looked like a newborn, wild and freaking out, but not for the right reasons.

Ever since then, Hadrian had forbidden everyone from hunting with him. Except Shiloh, she was the only one. She could take it. I wished I was as strong as she was…

We sat down and Sam dished out the feast.

I turned to him. "Bastian, I was think--"

His eyes were glued to the enormous stack of pancakes in front of him, a dreamy smile fixed on his face.

Well, I certainly wasn't going to get anything out of him any time soon.

Eight Pancakes, three sandwiches, 25 pieces of bacon, and an omelet, and four cups of milk later I was full.

I leaned back against the low divider wall between the kitchen and the dining room, satisfaction beginning to set on my face. Being full made me sleepy, and the odd sense of comfort I felt leaning back on the hard tool didn't help things.

I had just begun to drift, when I heard a key slide into the key hole of the front door.

My eyes snapped open, and I smacked Sebastian on the shoulder. He looked at me questioningly, but understood when he heard the door knob turn.

All three of us got up and deposited our plates on top of the mountain already forming in extra wide sink. It was extra wide for exactly that purpose.

Sam did the same with the pots, pans, and utensils. Then, she grabbed the air freshener from the cabinet and sprayed it all over the counter, and especially over the burners.

Hadrian didn't mind the smell of human food (though it smelled repulsive to all vampires) inhabitants of the house tried always to be respectful to the closest thing they had to a father.

The door opened, just as the four lined up in the living room.

Shiloh walked in first carrying groceries, five bags full. She was followed by Hadrian. As usual his appearance never ceased to amaze.

_Gosh, leave him for a couple hours, and then it's like you've never seen him before, _Sebastian thought to me. I smiled. How true it was.

Shiloh made her way to the kitchen, but Hadrian stopped to look at us. His contacts began to dissolve.

He looked at us, smirking. "At ease men…and woman." He came over smiling, "Guys, this isn't boot camp. You can lounge if you want. You think I bought the plasma so it could gather dust?"

Leander dropped his shoulders, and chuckled. "Well, that's a relief." He plopped down on one of the plus armchairs and rummaged around in the compartment for the remote.

"_But_," Hadrian said, looking at Leander, "we were supposed to be at the school five minutes ago."

We didn't take the cars, so Sam was thoroughly disappointed.

We ran for two minutes until we got to a part of woods that was directly connected to the woods around Hanson Lane High.

It was going to be boring, sitting around all day babysitting teens. Well, then again, I was one.

I picked up the pace as we ran; the signal to phase. Like always, it hurt, and unlike lucky shape shifters, you could never get used to the pain. I felt my muscles ripple, and then my body start to change. My bones rearranged themselves, breaking, joining, breaking, joining, elongating. I felt the millions of tiny pin pricks, as the fur started to grow. I heard my jaw crack then jut out. The neck was the most painful. I braced for the familiar sound of my head whiplashing outward, to elongate my neck.

Crack!

_Holy-- _I thought, but was cut off as I heard a roar to my right. Leander ripped by. His pure white fur was a blur as he flew ahead. Always the show off.

The whole thing to about five seconds, and then it was done.

I dug my paws into the earth, and flew after him. Behind me I heard Sebastian changing. I never liked hearing that. His pain.

But it was soon over, and all three of us were in full wolf form.

I was silver with a stripe of black from my forehead down to my tail, and I kept my vivid blue eyes. I glanced at Sebastian, beautiful; he was almost an opposite of me. He was black but silver started on his muzzle and eyes, and then made its way down his chest, and ended in a point. His two back paws were silver, and so was the tip of his tail. His eyes were green; it seemed that we retained our eye color when in wolf form. That was about all we did retain, not even our humaneness.

We ran together, side by side, with Leander leading. We saw the blur of the rest of the family, running a little distance away.

_Ugh. Keep your mind in your head, Leander. _Sebastian made a sort of grimace.

_What? _Leander asked innocently, turning his head back as he ran.

His memories of Sam and his lip-locked goodbye were going public. I shook my head to get them out.

_Why are we doing this again? _Bastian asked, thinking a sigh.

_Because. We're doing this for Laura as a favor, we owe her big._

_How does he know she's a vampire? _I asked.

_Hunting trip gone bad, _Leander said. _They visited him a few times, both were far apart. He knew there was something wrong, because she wasn't aging. Then they went out to hunt, and he coincidentally likes to hunt too, with a gun I mean. Normally they aren't "vegetarian", but they didn't want to hunt in her nephew's area. Anyway, he shot a buck and wounded it. It ran a ways. By the time he got there, they were already feeding on it. They had given in to their instincts, so restraining was harder, plus they weren't vegetarians all the time. If it wasn't for Beau, Don Hanson would be dead. He pulled her back. They haven't seen him since._

Laura was the only other vampire that Leander liked besides Sam, Hadrian, and Shiloh. We didn't see Beau and Laura much, but when we did they were always getting us out of some kind of trouble. Her nephew Principal Hanson had asked her if she could get him help with his problem. She had obviously known exactly what kind of problem it was, before he figured anything out. So she had sent our kind.

We curved right, and leaped over a creek.

_So we're pretty sure it's a werewolf? _I asked for clarification.

_Yup, pretty much, _Leander said.

_Oh, we're here._

Almost as soon as he said that, I saw the edge of the clearing, and beyond, the school. I skidded to a stop, inches from the edge, luckily (it was lunch break, and a particularly beautiful sunny afternoon).

Hadrian was already there looking past the trees at the clearing.

There was a half circle of lawn behind the school. It was scattered with tables, and the students were milling about. The circle was surrounded by the woods, and us.

"Sebastian," Hadrian said without turning.

Sebastian looked at me. _My turn. _One of us always had to stay in human form, so the vampires could communicate with us.

Sam pulled a pair of shorts out of her backpack, and gave them to him. With the shorts in his mouth, we bounded off to find a bush. Sam, being the one who loved a werewolf, carried our clothes when we needed them.

He came back and went to Hadrian, who was giving directions.

"Alright, if anything is going to get through us, then we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. We don't know where it will come from, so there's no point in preparing. What we need to prepare for, is when it tries to get back out. Once it gets back past us, then our chances go from some to slim. As usual, our greatest advantage is the fact that we have both the races among us. We want to finish this job as soon as possible, right? If he is going to be looking for opposition at all, he'll smell for rival werewolves. I don't think it's come across vampires before. I don't think it even knows vampires exist; otherwise he wouldn't have been so careless as to bleed a trail right to him. That gives us an edge. We need it to be sure that it's just werewolves. It looks like its going to be a simple Dog Tag. There's just one problem…"

"A Dog Tag involves one of us in the open," Shiloh finished.

The three vampires looked at us. "I'll go," Sebastian said, volunteering.

"No," Leander said, his voice warped in wolf form. "It's a male, I can smell him all over the ground. He'll recognize a female first…" He turned to look at me.

I nodded, but Bastian protested. "Wait. He's been attacking kids. Who's to say he won't just grab Emma?"

Sam spoke up. "If he tries to 'grab' Emma, then Emma will just give him a death punch! Plus, she's the age of those kids, she'll fit right in." She smiled at me.

I smiled back, which was, frankly, hard to do. She handed me some clothes and I padded back into the forest.

When I returned, they were arguing about God knows what.

Sebastian saw me and walked over anxiously. "Em, tell them it's crazy!"

"Tell them what's crazy?"

"We think it's a good idea that while you head out, the rest of us will circle around to the front of the school and wait. See, if we want its attention on you, we can't have our scents interfering. And unfortunately there's a breeze blowing from the school to the woods. Send Leander an image when you've got the beast pin pointed. We'll circle back and trap him. "

I thought about it. "It's not crazy."

Bastian looked at me with wide eyes. "What?! It's a full grown werewolf; it could rip you to shreds!"

"Hey," I smacked him, "I happen to be one too." I sent him the memory of me and Leander sparring, telepathically. He just blinked. Then he got to the part where I beat him, and he grinned.

"True." He hugged me. "Stay safe, okay?"

"Okay." With that, he took off running, shivers already running down his spine as he began to change. Leander followed, and then Sam. Shiloh touched my shoulder and gave me a comforting smile. Then she took Hadrian's hand and they sped after the others.

I was alone.

I looked around at my surroundings. I was just a few trees from the campus lawn. Peering into the woods behind me, I couldn't see anything. I could see far, farther than a human, but as far as I could see there was no sign of a beast. These woods would have been pretty; nice to walk through, if they didn't harbor something menacing lurking in the shadows.

_Well…better not let them down._

I took a deep breathe and left the cover of the trees.

A few students were lounging on the grass, some farther out. Not smart. If only they knew. Some of the students looked up as I walked by, but none really showed an interest. I kept walking; the density of humans more overwhelming with each step. I wasn't used to this, so close to them. I was more human then a vampire was, but still I felt awkward. I found an empty table, sat down, and concentrated on keeping myself alert. I spotted the Principal standing near the school doors, keeping an eye on the students. He saw me, and his eyes widened. Quickly, he erased all trace of bewilderment as to why I was out in the open, defying what he had said (he still thought _all _of us were vampires). He nodded and I nodded back.

I watched the edge of the clearing, looking for any signs of danger.

"Hi!" It startled me, but I composed myself and turned around. A guy about my age stood next to me, blocking the sun. He had brown hair and brown eyes. "Are you new here?"

"Umm, yeah."

"Funny, I thought I had met all of you. Oh well," he offered his hand, "I'm Zach."

I shook it. "Emma."

He sat down and popped open the can of soda he was holding. He took a swig, and leaned back. A few seconds passed, and I realized he was eyeing me. Of course I probably was a spectacle. All stiff, with my fists clenched.

"You okay?"

"Yeah." I wasn't, obviously. It was hard enough trying to keep my guard up amidst the throngs.

"So where you from?"

"Pennsylvania." That at least was true, although I didn't think I could tell the truth about pretty much anything else.

"Long way from Colorado."

"I guess so. You?"

"Oh I grew up here."

"That's cool."

We continued the small talk for several minutes, it was weird, but somehow nice to just talk to somebody the world saw as normal. Of course it was ruined, duh.

I heard a twig crack and snapped my head back in the direction of the woods. There was definitely something moving now.

Werewolves had a heightened sense of opportunity, if there was such a thing. Whenever they showed up, it was usually because they had unconsciously wandered into the path of the thing they most wanted at the time. Figure out what a werewolf wants, and you'll find the werewolf. Since, a student had disappeared I didn't have to guess. I scanned the green…

There.

One girl was alone; she was walking up the small incline of the grassy knoll. She sat down a few yards from the wood's edge, and pulled out a textbook.

I looked back in the direction of the sound I heard. He was moving, the students couldn't hear it, but I could. The sounds were faint, but I head excellent hearing, and not to mention, I knew what I werewolf sounded like. It obviously was too engrossed in its prey, to smell me. Plan fail.

I made a mental note of the girl and her surroundings, and sent it to Leander.

_He's going for her._

_Got it._

Okay, now the cavalry were coming, they'd be only a few seconds away.

I turned back to the werewolf.

He was gone. Or at least I couldn't hear the sounds.

I let my eyes move, still on the tree line, but heading for the girl.

There. He was a lot closer, in the seconds I took to call for help; he was less than twenty yards away.

The only thing that was in my head was: _They're not going to be here in time._

I practically leaped off the bench. I heard Zach call, and ask where I was going in such a hurry, but I didn't care. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Dr. Hanson grab the whistle that hung around his neck and blow it.

"Everybody inside, NOW!!" he roared. The fact that the students obeyed said that the good principal didn't raise his voice often, but when he did, people listened.

Rocketing across the lawn, I timed my phase to start before I reached the trees, with the obvious physical changes coming after I was out of the students' sight. I tore through the first trees, about forty yards behind the wolf. When the rest of us got here, he'd be trapped.

A few minutes later I was padding through the woods, to position myself at the best vantage point. Then, my leg muscles coiled, and I shot forward. Running at full speed, the distance went by in the matter of a few seconds. Finally I broke into a less dense part of the forest, and saw him. He was big, bigger than me, with dark grey fur. A scar ran from behind his ear, down his neck, to his shoulder. That would definitely explain the blood. The first kid must have had a bowie knife.

He turned around to look at me, his silver eyes boring holes into my head. I growled.

We were still near the edge, so I could see the girl still sitting on the lawn. She had looked up, wondering why everyone was leaving early. Then I spotted the Principal, he was running as fast as his heart could take. He was trying to get to the girl.

He needed a distraction.

I advanced. The big wolf tensed, watching me suspiciously. I bared my teeth, and he bared his. He looked at me, unsure what was going on. It was obvious he hadn't expected company. I growled at him and pushed my thoughts forward.

_Leave, or we will hurt you._

He chuckled, but ignored me.

That was all the time it took. _Look behind you._

He did, and saw the girl was gone. Frantically, he searched the grounds. He spotted her running into the school followed by the principal.

I smiled, but it was short lived.

He turned back furious. With a roar he launched himself into the air towards me. I braced myself for the tumble, but it never happened.

In mid air, a snow white streak flew out of from his left, and rammed him in side. He was stopped, and he flew into a tree. I heard a few bones crack, but he was tough. He got back up, and roared at Leander and me. I could see it in his eyes, now he wasn't sure he would win, not against two. He was weighing his options, when Bastian ripped through and stopped by my other side. Shiloh and Sam came running, and spread out making a circle around the werewolf. Hadrian was there too, completing the circle.

The wolf panicked trying to run, but was hit back by one of us. He had no idea who the humans were,—well, human _looking_ at least—but knew they were strong. But he was smart, he found the weakest link.

Sam. She was strong, as far as vampires go, but I didn't think she could take on a werewolf. She was after all only 17, well more like 56, in vampire years.

The wolf struck. I thought wrong.

Sam simply dropped and flicked her foot out. She tripped his front legs, making his face slam into the ground.

He tried to get up, but there was clearly something wrong with his neck. He was fidgeting and flopping like a fish.

Shiloh walked towards him.

"Wait!" I yelled. "Does he have to die?"

"He's going to come back, if we leave him. You can't change a werewolf's mind easily. Besides, he won't be able to phase back with that injury."

I sighed.

Sam ran over to Leander and hugged his neck, burying her face in it. She hated seeing werewolves die, for obvious reasons.

Shiloh took the wolf's neck in a sleeper hold. She could barely reach around it, but it was enough. With a quick jerk, the wolf yelped and went limp.

"Get changed. We need to tell Hanson," Hadrian said quietly. He was walking toward the body with a lighter.

Sam let go of Leander, and handed us all clothes. We retreated to put them on.

When we came back the flames were already eating him, no one would know. Sam was staring at it with wide eyes, until Leander came and hugged her. She resisted the urge to cry.

I was staring at the fire too, seeing one of my race burning on the ground. He would be no more than ash soon.

Sebastian took my hand. "Hey. Let's go."

I gave him a weak smile and the group left the trees. We walked across the lawn, wondering if anyone inside had heard the roars of a beast.


End file.
